History

Amy Philo started the UNITE website in January 2007, as an adjunct to her work as a Co-Founder of Children and Adults Against Drugging America (CHAADA). The mission of UNITE is to bring together existing groups and individuals who are already working to educate and reform and help them become more unified towards the common goal of preventing death and harm from psychiatric drugs, electroshock, and other dangerous “treatments.”

babywhys.org is a pro-family, pro-natural parenting website advocating breastfeeding, babywearing, cosleeping, health awareness and other lifestyle choices that can help babies grow up healthy and happy.

momsandmeds.com was founded by a group of several experts and survivors in 2008 in response to the crisis of drugging pregnant and new mothers. Article submissions are welcome.

If you are interested in publishing on the UNITE blog, please contact amy@uniteforlife.org.

Activists

The UNITE/CHAADA/MADNAP conglomerate has brought together some of the most outspoken and determined victims and experts in the world to fight for truth and safety. To become a member of CHAADA (for free) please go to: http://www.chaada.org/contact.html

To add your site to the UNITE listings or become a contributor on the UNITE or MADNAP blogs, please email amy@uniteforlife.org.

Read this list of just a few of our members for a glimpse into the efforts taking place all over the world to help prevent more tragedies:

Kim Witczak, who has made at least 40 trips to Washington, D.C. to work on drug safety reform. Kim’s late husband Woody committed suicide after only five weeks on Zoloft he was taking for insomnia after getting an exciting new job. Kim has worked extensively with Consumers Union.

Mathy Milling Downing, whose twelve-year-old daughter Candace hanged herself while taking Zoloft for test anxiety. Mathy has worked with over 30 anti-drug organizations across the country and was instrumental in helping attain the first FDA black box suicide warning in 2004.

Julie Edgington, a mother who took Paxil for a couple of weeks and then learned she was pregnant. Despite discontinuing the drug during the first trimester, Julie’s son Manie was born with Transposition of the Great Arteries. He nearly died at birth and had open heart surgery at 8 days. Manie nearly lost his leg. Read more about Manie at www.bigpharmavictim.blogspot.com.

Jenny Hatch, a mother who was force-drugged by psychiatrists and the courts for months as a first time mom. Jenny survived psychiatric treatment despite becoming extremely suicidal on the medications, and she has spent the past 18 years speaking out against force drugging. Her story has been featured in various magazines and books. Jenny has also been censored and banned on online forums for mothering.com for speaking out against psychiatric drugs, and was fired from a volunteer position with Depression After Delivery for warning mothers not to take drugs. Watch her video of her shocking story and awesome recovery with natural healing here. Read her blog here: http://www.naturalfamilyblog.com/

Kim Crespi, whose husband David killed their twin daughters in 2006 while taking Prozac. Kim has been featured on Oprah, 20/20 and in People magazine. Her husband is currently serving back to back life sentences for the murder of his girls. Kim’s site is www.crespifamilyhope.com.

Patricia Weathers, Founder of Ablechild, is a mother of two boys ages 15 and 8. She lives in New York State. She has testified at two Congressional Hearings (9/29/00 and 9/26/02) on the role of behavioral drugs and schools. She, as President of Ablechild testified before the FDA in October of 2004, a hearing on antidepressant drugs and their link to violence and suicide ideation. She with Ablechild played a key role in the FDA’s implementation of the Black Box Warnings on antidepressants in 2004, a victory for all human rights crusaders everywhere. Patricia Weathers with Ms. Sheila Matthew founded Ablechild (2001) championing parental and children rights to ensure that all individuals have their right to full informed consent and their right to refuse psychological/psychiatric services upheld. Their wish is that Ablechild will be the voice of parents everywhere struggling with various issues such as ADD/ADHD and other psychiatric labels, forced child drugging, informed consent and their right to privacy. She has been featured on over two dozen media outlets (Good Morning America, Hannity and Colmes, The Today Show, The New York Times, …….) and in many more publications.

Sheila Matthews, Co-Founder of AbleChild, is the mother of two boys ages 13 and 10. She lives in the State of Connecticut and is the first mother to successfully testify on behalf of the First State Law in the United States (2001) prohibiting school personnel from recommending psychotropic drugs to parents. Sheila advocated on behalf of children in Connecticut State care to effectively remove certain dangerous antidepressants from use on foster care children/wards of the State. Ms. Matthews with Ablechild participated in two Connecticut Statewide Educational Conferences on Special Education. She has been featured on CNN as well as Time Magazine (Colin Powell ED. Sept. 10, 2001) questioning the validity of ADD/ADHD and the harmful recommended drug “treatments.” Today, Ms. Matthews is a frequent guest on numerous Talk Radio shows. She continues to advocate for stronger informed consent laws and is outspoken on forced drug “treatment” and drug research being conducted on children.

Shelly Hart, an RN who took Paxil during pregnancy and had a baby who nearly died at birth and suffered from PPHN, or persistent pulmonary hypertension of the neonate. Shelly is writing a book on the horrors of Paxil withdrawal. Shelly is a Co-Founder of MADNAP. Read her blog at: shelly-hartheaven.blogspot.com.

Dr. Gary Hart, Ph.D.has published widely on rural health care, health workforce, clinical practice variation, geographic definition methodology, and perinatal care issues. In 1995, Dr. Hart received the National Rural Health Association’s Distinguished Researcher award. Dr. Hart is the Director of the Arizona Rural Health Office and an Endowed Professor of Public Health at the Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health at the University of Arizona. Dr. Hart received his PhD in Medical Geography in 1985 from the University of Washington. He was formerly the director for two decades of the Rural Health Research Center at the University of Washington in Seattle. Since he and his family members including daugher Sara, wife Shelly, and two other children have had life-altering adverse reactions from Paxil, he has been speaking out and educating medical professionals about the dangers of SSRIs. He is also a Co-Founder of MADNAP.

Veronika Robinson is the editor of The Mother magazine in the UK and the author of The Drinks Are On Me. She is a Co-Founder of MADNAP.

Ellen Liversidge, a MADNAP Co-Founder, CHAADA member and a member of the board of theAlliance for Human Research Protection. Ellen’s son died from hyperglycemia caused by Zyprexa. Ellen is also a Co-Founder of MADNAP.

Dr. Ann Blake Tracy, who founded the International Coalition For Drug Awareness and has worked extensively with victims from Columbine, mothers who killed their children, and consulted in many other sad cases of mass murder and murder-suicide. She is the author of Prozac: Panacea or Pandora? Our Serotonin Nightmare. Dr. Tracy has worked with Amy Philo on The MOTHERS Act campaign and traveled to Washington, D.C. to protest the bill. She is also a Co-Founder of MADNAP.

Dr. Peter and Ginger Breggin, who have spent their lives exposing the harm caused by psychiatry. Check out their sites www.breggin.com and www.icspp.org.

Dr. John Breeding, author of The Wildest Colts Make the Best Horses and founder of www.wildestcolts.com andwww.endofshock.com. Dr. Breeding is a professor of psychology and an expert on the history of psychiatric torture and eugenics. He campaigns against drugging children as well as psychiatric drugs and electroshock for adults.

Dr. Grace Jackson, a psychiatrist and author of Rethinking Psychiatric Drugs. Dr. Jackson is also a Co-Founder of MADNAP, our latest project established to address the crisis of drugging nursing and pregnant women, at www.momsandmeds.com.

Dr. Dan L. Edmunds, Ed.D., an activist and counselor who helps others through compassionate, empathetic talk therapy. He established the International Center for Humane Psychiatry.

Rosie Meysenburg and Sara Bostock, founders of ssristories.com, a database of more than 2500 media articles concerning bizarre behavior, criminal activity, murder and murder-suicide linked to the use of antidepressants.

Cassandra Casey, founder of the Alliance to Stop Psychiatry’s Influence in Religion and Education, or ASPIRE.

Linda Valentine, the mother of a survivor of antipsychotic drugs, member of MindFreedom and an anti-drug activist.

Camille Milke, mother of drug-induced suicide victim, Sarina Cuoco. Camille established theCOPES Foundation in 2007 and is fighting for a ban on suicide-causing antidepressants. She successfully campaigned for a memorial in the state of New Mexico to investigate antidepressants, and has traveled to Washington, D.C. with Amy Philo and other members to campaign to stop The MOTHERS Act. Sarina left behind a two year old daughter.

Ben Merhav, whose daughter Rebecca is currently being forcibly drugged and experimented on by psychiatrists in Australia. Rebecca has been the subject of this torture for 30 years and miraculously is still fighting. Please see our home page at www.uniteforlife.org for more on the campaign to free Rebecca from the compulsory treatment order.

Cynthia Garcia, founder of the national Prozac Survivors support group.

Jay Baadsgaard, the father of Corey Baadsgaard who held his class hostage at gunpoint under the influence of psychotropic drugs. Jay is the Washington state director for the ICFDA.

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16 thoughts on “History”

Of course drug companies influence doctors to recommend more drugs, just like lobbyist influence congress. However, the battle begins at home by holding parents accountable for their actions. People don’t seek relief from child psychologists or counselors when things are fine at home. Start pointing the finger at the parents and at home, hold them accountable, educate them and teach them that children typically aren’t born with “issues”. I agree drugs are used too often with children but you give parents a free pass. Parents have the most influence on our children and the reason they go for help is because they want things to be easier. Parents don’t want to parent and do not want to believe n anyway that they are the primary cause of their children’s behavior. Say what ever you want, make excuses for whatever you want but I truth be told that nearly every behavioral problem can be traced backed to poor parenting. Check the statistics in prison for starters. I have never known a child or an adult with a psychological disorder or character problem that could not be directly related to the quality of their parenting. I always amazes me that when parents seek relief for problems with their children they almost NEVER take responsibility for changing their own behavior while they seek outside help to change their child’s behavior. Most childhood “problems” could be resolved quite nicely if the parents sought counseling for their deficiencies regarding their parenting skills before anything else.

@Chris: It’s true that many problems are caused by poor parenting, but even good parents and parents who do their best sometimes have problems with their child or children. There are also the negative influences on children of TV, movies, music, and peers.

The mission of UNITE is to educate people about the harm caused by psychotropic drugs and other psychiatric intervention. No parent, however vulnerable or wise or of whatever parenting style, can take responsibility for the consequences of a drug given to their child if the drug companies are dishonest and / or the doctor prescribing it misinforms the parents. Your philosophy would make more sense if psychiatrists did not attempt to pathologize normal behavior and claim, for example, that it’s not your child’s sensitivity that is the question, or even as you suggest, the parent’s behavior, but it is an underlying biochemical imbalance in your child. When a doctor claims your child is bipolar or has a ‘mental disorder’ and needs drugs, suddenly you become a ‘bad parent’ if you do not comply.

With complete information, parents are more likely to see that their children are not defective and to work on any issues that might be present in the family dynamic.

That being said there are many other tactics to get people on drugs besides saying the child has bad behavior. As was done to me, the doctor may scare a patient into taking it by talking about the dangers of depression and calling a new mom at risk following a traumatic experience.

There’s force, misdiagnosis, lack of informed consent, and numerous other methods employed to get people to agree to take drugs. Take guilt. Now people are telling women if they are stressed during pregnancy it will cause their child to have schizophrenia later in life. So go take this drug while you’re pregnant.

I am a nurse-midwife student and came across your website while doing research on postpartum depression and the MOTHERS Act. I have read most of your website and have a few questions for you. The MOTHERS Act seems to me to have good intentions of helping women and their families recognize PPD and to seek help. Nowhere in the bill does it state that treatment would be strictly pharmaceutical. The bill is in support of education, research, recognition of PPD, and treatment. To me treatment could be in the form of therapy, support groups, etc. and then if not effective pharmaceuticals would be considered. I would like to hear your views as to why you feel this bill will push pharmaceuticals on women. I feel it necessary for something to be done in order to help the women who suffer from this and often do not receive any help at all.
Thank You,
Tina

Tina,
Please watch my youtube video and Julie Edgington’s video. You’re right that in addition to pushing drugs they push hospitalization and therapy as well as social support. When you become a midwife and find it acceptable to drug new moms or even pregnant moms at all, then you will start to see your patients deteriorate like I did, become homicidal and suicidal, lose babies, have babies with birth defects etc. The credo of your profession is supposed to be do no harm. Please look into it a little more. You can email me at amy@uniteforlife.org – Sorry I can’t comment any more right this moment because I am running late but if you don’t understand after looking through the site more what the problem is with moms and babies increasingly dying as a result of the increased drugging, I would be more than happy to explain it again.

Chris,
I disagree with your position. When a child is born with (or develops) biochemical imbalances, yeast overgrowth, bacterial dysbiosis, metabolic disorders, chronic viral infection, and other related issues, their behavior will be affected, as so many wonderful parents with children with autism, ADHD, etc. witness firsthand every day. When the underlying imbalances are treated – NOT with drugs, but naturally – behavior improves. All the wonderful, caring, loving parenting in the world is not going to heal underlying physical disorders. Neither children nor adults should, however, be treated with any form of antidepressants or mood-altering drugs. Discounting the problem by saying kids just need a better home life does nothing to solve the problem – instead this attitude perpetuates the problem and prevents children from receiving natural, wholistic treatment for the underlying imbalances.

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